ORAL HISTORY & RESEARCH

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I am an independent oral and social historian with more than 15 years' experience recording, researching and interpreting people's lived experience.

I have conducted around 200 oral-history and research interviews, working with people from a wide range of communities and backgrounds. My work has contributed to more than 30 exhibitions, films, publications and public-history projects, reaching audiences in the thousands.

I work with museums, universities, heritage organisations, community groups, filmmakers and cultural organisations to develop oral-history projects that are rigorous, ethical, engaging and useful beyond the interview itself

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SELECTED PROJECTS

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RIVER CITY

 

 

VOICES OF THE WYE

Oral Historian | 2024 – 2025

I am the commissioned oral historian for Voices of the Wye, an oral-history project contributing to the development of Hereford Museum.

The project records memories, experiences and personal relationships with the River Wye, creating testimony that can contribute to the museum's interpretation of the river and its place in people's lives.

It also returns me to a landscape I have been researching for many years, including through my first book, River Voices: Extraordinary Stories from the Wye.

CHANNEL VIEWS — STORY ARCS

Story Fellow | 2025 – 2026

I was selected as a Story Fellow with Story Arcs, an AHRC-funded research leadership and professional-development programme led by Bath Spa University in collaboration with Cardiff Metropolitan University.

My project, Channel Views, uses oral history and reminiscence within a senior social-housing community.

The work explores memory, storytelling, ageing, community and place while developing my wider research practice.

HEREFORDSHIRE LORE

Editor | Oral Historian | Reminiscence Facilitator | 2015 – present

I have worked with Herefordshire Lore for more than a decade, interviewing people across the county and helping preserve and communicate their histories.

I edit the quarterly social-history journal In Our Age and deliver reminiscence sessions in communities across Herefordshire.

The work reflects a principle central to my practice: local history is not small history.

The experiences of individuals and communities can illuminate much larger histories of work, migration, family, agriculture, housing, landscape and social change.

LIFE ON THE LEVELS

Oral Historian & Reminiscence Practitioner | 2018 – 2023

My work on the Gwent Levels involved recording lived experience and community memory relating to this distinctive South Wales landscape.

I was particularly interested in the knowledge held by people who had lived and worked there and in the relationship between landscape, livelihood, memory and identity.

This strand of research ultimately informed my third book, This Stolen Land: A People's History of the Gwent Levels.

CLAPHAM STORIES

Oral Historian | 2023

Commissioned by Gloucester Voices to record the memories and experiences of remaining residents of Clapham Tower in Gloucester.

The interviews captured histories of housing, home, neighbourhood, community and social change through the voices of the people who experienced them.

WESTGATE STORIES

Oral Historian & Reminiscence Practitioner | 2022

Working with the Gloucester Cathedral Quarter project, I recorded memories connected with Westgate Street in Gloucester.

Oral-history interviews and reminiscence contributed to Westgate Stories, a publication documenting the social history of one of the city's historic streets.

HEREFORDSHIRE LIFE THROUGH A LENS

Oral Historian & Researcher | Catcher Media | 2015 – 2019

I worked as an oral historian and researcher on a Heritage Lottery Fund-supported series of documentary films exploring Herefordshire's social history.

The work combined archival research, interviewing and documentary storytelling to bring personal and community histories to wider audiences.

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REMINISCENCE

I have more than a decade's experience facilitating reminiscence, including dementia-friendly work in residential, nursing and care settings.

I have delivered approximately 100 sessions, using photographs, objects, artefacts, archive material and other prompts to encourage memory, conversation and connection.

This work has influenced my wider oral-history practice considerably.

It has taught me to work with memories that may be fragmented or uncertain without assuming they are therefore without meaning.

It has also reinforced something fundamental to my approach:

people need to be given time to remember.

WHAT I CAN BRING TO A PROJECT

I can contribute at different stages of an oral-history, research or public-history project, including:

• Project development and research design

• Oral-history interviewing

• Life-history and qualitative interviewing

• Background and archival research

• Identifying themes and lines of enquiry

• Community engagement

• Reminiscence

• Interviewer training and support

• Interpretation of oral testimony

• Writing and editing

• Developing material for publications and exhibitions

• Documentary and media research

• Talks and public engagement

• Collaborative research and partnership working

I am comfortable working independently or as part of a larger interdisciplinary team.